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Thomas Vanek Bio
Info
Birthday - 19.Jänner, 1984
Place of birth - Baden, Austria
Jersey# - 26
Position - LW
Height - 6'2"
Weight - 207 pounds
Parents - Zdenek und Jarmila Vanek
Family - wife Ashley, son Blake Thomas
Hobbies - Soccer, Tennis, Fishing and Golf
Favorite food: steak with potatoes
Favorite band/musician: U2 and Green Day
Favorite album: everything from U2
Favorite film: Old School
Favorite book: Hermann Maiers biography
Favorite holidays: Paris
Hobbies: Golf (Handicap 12), Tennis, Soccer, fishing
Biggest success: Winning the NCAA-championship
Hardest defeat: Every year in which my team does not win the cup/championship
Pet: Dog ("Diesel")
Role model: Hermann Maier, Tiger Woods, Roger Federer
Always on target
Even when he was young one thing was clear for Thomas: "I want to be a player in the NHL!" Already in 1998 he made his international breakthrough scoring 21 goals in only 14 games at the Quebec "Pee Wee Tournament", the biggest junior-tournament worldwide. Thomas was voted into the All-Star-Team of the tournament and canadian newspapers started drawing comparisons to Mario Lemieux. Also, a few decades earlier another player made people's heads turn at this tournament: none other than Wayne Gretzky himself...
Off to the new world
But that was only the first step. The second would be much harder. Aged 14 Thomas started to outgrow the Austrian hockey-world. The logical conclusion was to go overseas. Here the first station were the "Lacoka Wolves" in Canadas AAA-league. There Thomas scored 76 goals and 36 Assists in only 40 games. The next step brought Thomas into the USHL (the highest junior league of the US) to Sioux Falls Stampede. There Thomas registered 80 goals and 73 assists during his three year and 108 games-stint with the Stampede. In his last year with Sioux Falls Thomas even broke the club record by scoring 46 goals and 45 assists.
Austrian at heart
Suddenly, Europe started to take interest in the "lost son". Slovakia found out that Thomas' mother was Slovakian and invited the rising star to join the national team's trainingscamp. Thomas declined the slovakian invitation. Instead he joined the Austrian junior squad under coach Greg Holst.
First Euro Gopher
By deciding to play for Austria, Thomas could once again focus on his own career. The next step was joining the Minnesota Golden Gophers college hockey team. So, in the season 2002/03 Thomas became the first European ever to take the ice for the Gopers in hockey-mad St.Paul/Minneapolis. What followed was one of the most outstanding rookie-seasons in US-college-hockey: 31 goals, 31 assists in 45 regular season games, and finally the triumph at the "frozen four". There he scored the game winning goals in the semi-finals and in the final. Furthermore, Thomas was voted MVP of the tournament, voted into the All-Star-Team of the tournament and - of course - rookie of the year.
Becoming a Sabre
To read the rest of this article and learn more about Thomas please visit his personal website @
http://www.thomasvanek.at/index.php?id=35&L=1
